Entities such as consumers, organizations, enterprises, governments, etc. need to exchange data for a variety of reasons, as may be easily imagined. In the modern world, this data exchange is often times accomplished electronically using a variety of methodologies. These methodologies include, for example, local storage (e.g. a thumb driver holding the data which can be physically delivered to a recipient), file transfer using particular protocols (e.g. file transfer protocol (FTP)), sending an email with an attachment, facsimile (fax), etc.
While all these methods serve the same end, each of these methodologies has differing capabilities with respect to various characteristics such as ease of use, speed, security (e.g. the ability to resist interception or tampering), traceability, cost, etc. For example, using local storage may not feasible if two entities are widely dispersed geographically, while email attachments may not be secure enough to address some entities' concerns.
Faxing, while still heavily utilized by individuals and the workflows of various enterprises, may also present some difficulties. A fax comprises a document in a digital image format. The document is associated with a destination specified with respect to a publicly switched telephone network (PSTN). Thus, typically for at least a portion of the transmission, the document is transmitted over the PSTN. Faxing provides a secure, traceable and non-repudiable mechanism for content delivery and can be particularly useful in business environments.
Faxing, however, has limitations. For example, conventional fax machines can only transmit black and white files with limited resolution in a specific format such as the Tagged Image File Format (TIFF). Further, the transmission speed over the PSTN can be very slow compared to today's computer based networks. Additionally, as faxing may use the PSTN, faxing between two entities that are in different geographic area may require an expensive phone call. Accordingly, traditional faxing may be expensive as well as slow.
Thus, what is desired is a way of exchanging data in manner that is easy to use, relatively fast, secure and cost effective and yet still may be compatible with previous methods for data exchange, especially those that that may have been utilized in various workflows, such as faxing, etc.